Joe Piscopo's variety show

December 26, 2009|By Nate Martin and FOR REDEYE

Joe Piscopo might be Jersey to the core, but lately he's been busy in Chicago. The former "Saturday Night Live" star has been holding auditions at downtown's The Joynt nightclub for "Joe Piscopo After Dark," a TV variety show he'll soon be shopping to networks.

He's also been hanging around Germania Place, an elegant Gold Coast ballroom at which he'll perform a benefit on New Year's Eve for Kids Fight Cancer. RedEye caught up with Piscopo this week to talk about his time on "SNL," his take on "Jersey Shore" and his battle with cancer.

NATE MARTIN IS A REDEYE SPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR.

Did you ever come across any of the Second City comedians while you were doing "SNL"?

Yeah, the original cast, to me, was the best. They were rogue, wild, against everything that we'd learned. They broke all laws, and it was great. But when we went on, we didn't do great. After the first season with the new cast, Eddie Murphy and I were the only ones they didn't fire. The show needed to regroup, so they sent us to Chicago. We went to Second City and we stayed at Tim Kazurinsky's house. We went in every night and we did sets at Second City, with Jimmy Belushi and all the great folks who were working there at the time. That was pretty scary, but it was pretty awesome. And then we took some of the Second City crew back with us as part of the "SNL" cast.

Could you talk about your own personal experience with cancer?

I was on "SNL." I was just about 30 years old, and I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. I was doing great, working so hard, being on "Saturday Night Live" doing what I wanted to be doing, and then my brother-in-law -- an ear, nose and throat guy -- says, "You've got something going on in there," so they took a biopsy. I was young and cocky, thinking, "I got this beat," you know? And sure enough, the biopsy came back as cancer. That was wild. They gave me a cure rate of 90, but once you hear that, you always live with the fear of it coming back. ... And then think of a kid having cancer. I can't imagine.

There's been some controversy regarding "Jersey Shore" and its portrayal of Italians from New Jersey like yourself. What is your take?

Well, I know of the show but I haven't seen it. Do they say "We're Italian" on the show?

Yeah, they call each other "guidos" and "guidettes."

That's insulting, and it's demeaning. ... If you're Italian you can joke about Italians, if you're from New Jersey you can joke about New Jersey, but if you're not, don't even think about it.

Only one of the cast members is from Jersey, and they imported the rest.

[Groans] Oh, that's the ultimate insult of all! ... But I'll tell you, on the Italian front, everything's so derogatory toward Italian-Americans -- and I didn't realize this until I got older -- but if you did these shows like "Jersey Shore" about any other ethnic group, there would be legislation to stop it. But with Italians, we just shrug our shoulders. We're used to it.

Maybe it's because Italians have risen to a certain level in this country that people feel like they can take pot shots at them.

[Laughs] That is a great observation. I guess that means we've become almost mainstream.